The Gröna Tåget is rather unique as a research and development programme since it brings together both institutes of higher research and education, infrastructure managers, railway companies, consultants and train manufacturers in a common programme. The objective has been to develop a concept proposal for a new, attractive high-speed train adapted to Nordic conditions that is flexible for several different tasks in railway passenger operations.

The programme is conducted between 2005 and 2012 as a collaboration between the Swedish Transport Administration (Trafikverket, formerly Banverket), the supply industry (Bombardier Transportation, Schunk and Liebherr), the Association of Swedish train operators, SJ AB, Tågkompaniet, the train leasing company Transitio, as well as universities (KTH, Konstfack and Chalmers). Research institutes and consultants such as VTI, Interfleet Technology, Transrail, Ferroplan, MTO also participate. Vinnova (the Swedish Governmental Agency for Innovation Systems) has also supported the programme.

KTH (the Royal Institute of Technology, Stockholm) is responsible for coordination of the programme and the final reports, in addition to research in specific areas.

The concept proposal can act as a bank of ideas, recommendations and technical solutions for railway companies, infrastructure managers and the manufacturing industry. The results is to a high degree an open source, which means that it is accessible to all conceivable stakeholders.

The research programme has already attracted the interest of the industry both in Sweden and other countries during the years we have been working on it. We do not, however, have a finished train to show, but the results of the programme are presented primarily in seminars and in two final reports that are based on a large number of research reports.